best army in FoG

philqw78 · Post by **philqw78** » Wed Dec 29, 2010 6:41 pm

marco wrote:good mounted schock troop
(hch with crossbow are funy againts cat)
lf cat killer

Chariots are a reasonable shock troop. Certainly not good IMO.

footslogger · Post by **footslogger** » Wed Dec 29, 2010 6:52 pm

frederic wrote: As many wargamers, I build armies I like because of the history background, the quality of the miniatures or the tactic I could use with.

I'm almost exclusively driven by the quality of miniatures available. I'm thinking about doing something new in the new year and thought maybe a different approach, picking a great army as the starting point then making do with what I could find as far as miniatures go would be an interesting change.

I was hoping folks who have a track record of winning would opine on what they thought best.

philqw78 · Post by **philqw78** » Wed Dec 29, 2010 6:56 pm

I occassionally win when using lancers, lots of them.

olivier · Post by **olivier** » Wed Dec 29, 2010 7:02 pm

I win when I have fun with the army and when I attack.
I generally lose when I choose to defend

May be it's genetic!
The more important is to have fun with your army even when you lose.

hazelbark · Post by **hazelbark** » Sat Jan 01, 2011 8:20 pm

Also their is an army that fits your own style of play.

The best army that required patience, would fail in the hands of an impetuous player.

I worked up an army that had some strong advantages for a competition play, practiced it once and decided I would rather gauge my eyes out then play that army. It was too much of a slogger.

There was a time that people fancied Dominate Roman as the uber army. But a lot of people haven't got the knack of it. Other armies are powerful, until people reflect on how to beat it.

The nice things about FOG is the rock-scissors-paper aspect that means the uber army has a predator out there. The only current area of weakness, which seems more common in some places is the army designed not too lose.

petedalby · Post by **petedalby** » Sun Jan 02, 2011 2:18 pm

I'd agree with most of the other posts - there is no single best army. Whatever the composition, most competent players can put together something that can beat it. The challenge is finding something that is pretty good or versatile against other armies. If you go too one dimensional you will fall into the rock / paper / scissors trap.

It's also important to choose something that suits your style of play and that you enjoy using. I'd rather lose and enjoy the game than win and not enjoy the game.

MatthewP · Post by **MatthewP** » Tue Jan 04, 2011 8:38 am

For me its Medieval Arogonese. A real fighting army. Its weakest troops are the armoured offensive spear, which tells you all you need to know in my opinion. If you like aggressive tough armies then this is one of the best you can get. Great fun. Wont win you any tournaments though.

Fluffy · Post by **Fluffy** » Fri Jan 07, 2011 10:13 am

Also remember we do this for fun, any army you like is just as good idea as the most competitive thing you can come up with.

ShrubMiK · Post by **ShrubMiK** » Sat Jan 08, 2011 5:00 pm

Indeed. Most of the advice offered around here does tend to be of the "if you want to have a chance of placing highly at tournaments" variety. Not that I'm saying that is invalid, but it's not the only way to approach things.

footslogger · Post by **footslogger** » Sat Jan 08, 2011 6:15 pm

ShrubMiK wrote:Indeed. Most of the advice offered around here does tend to be of the "if you want to have a chance of placing highly at tournaments" variety. Not that I'm saying that is invalid, but it's not the only way to approach things.

That's actually what I'm looking for, because it's a different approach to army selection than I usually take. I usually look for great looking figures then figure out how to make something out of it. Starting out by saying what would be a killer army is backwards.

Fluffy · Post by **Fluffy** » Tue Jan 11, 2011 7:39 pm

I find that there are so many ways to make a "killer" army that I need something trivial to start with.

Like "I like shiny troops" or "I hate Romans" for example.

footslogger · Post by **footslogger** » Tue Jan 11, 2011 8:34 pm

Fluffy wrote:I find that there are so many ways to make a "killer" army that I need something trivial to start with.

Like "I like shiny troops" or "I hate Romans" for example.

I'd say "I like blowing things up" but that probably wouldn't help....

philqw78 · Post by **philqw78** » Tue Jan 11, 2011 8:36 pm

footslogger wrote:I'd say "I like blowing things up" but that probably wouldn't help....

You're right. This is not the place to talk about your girlfriend

DrQuahog · Post by **DrQuahog** » Wed Jan 12, 2011 11:56 pm

The famous '4 criteria' for choosing an army-

1) Do you want to paint it?
2) Do you want to play it?
3) Will it win games for you?
4) Does it have historical 'charisma' for you?

You just have to weigh how much importance you put on each.
It should also be pointed out in the search for the 'best army' that ,say,an opening repertoire for a chess world championship match would be an absolutely horrible choice for the average club player. The same goes for mini armies when confusing what wins power tournies with what will do best for the average grunt.

azrael86 · Post by **azrael86** » Thu Mar 17, 2011 10:14 pm

grahambriggs wrote: The ELO value should tell you what armies will do well or badly when played by average players. Not surprising that Santa Hernandad is on the top slot - it's stuffed full of tough stuff. So in a typical "walk forward and fight" encounter between two average palyer it should be fine.

In general the ELO is probably only true for armies in the first four or five books. Certainly the StE, EotD and B&G armies (except for aztec) barely appear out of theme.

For instance Kofun-Nara has a strong ELO (1723), but based on just 23 games (over half of which were at a single tournament) and none against an army with Knights...